BELMONT – South Point High started fast, held off a Crest rally and was able to celebrate an outright Big South 3A softball title Friday afternoon with a 9-5 home victory.

The Red Raiders (18-3, 11-0) are now one victory away from even more history. South Point visits Kings Mountain on Tuesday with the opportunity to complete its first-ever unbeaten league season.

“We talked all week long about how we wanted to finish the season strong,” said South Point coach Chip Wilson, whose team was co-league champion with Crest a year ago. “Our goal was to be outright champs. And we played hard and played well and accomplished that goal.”

The Red Raiders scored at least one run in each of the first four innings to take an 8-0 lead. And then after Crest scored twice in the fifth and sixth innings, South Point tallied another run.

Still, Crest (14-4, 9-2) managed to get the potential tying run to the plate before second baseman Kristen McAndrew corralled a sharply hit grounder and flipped to shortstop Summer Davila for a game-ending force out.

“We came out and hit the ball,” said Wilson, whose team had 15 hits off two Crest pitchers. “We didn’t want to play not to lose; We wanted to play to win. It takes that type of effort to beat a team like that.”

Macie Kinley’s three hits, including a three-run homer, led the South Point offense. McAndrew, Davila, Morgan Mahaffey, Sarah Abernathy and Lindsey Lee added two hits apiece for the Red Raiders, who have now won six titles in school history.

Lee’s two-out RBI single to right got the Red Raiders’ going in the first inning. Davila’s RBI single and Kinley’s three-run homer – both with two outs – accounted for the four-run second. Taylor Chapparo scored the third-inning run on a throwing error. And the final two runs scored on McAndrew’s fifth-inning sacrifice fly and Lee’s seventh-inning, two-out RBI single.

The only bad news for South Point came when freshman outfielder Sarah Beth Gibson suffered what appeared to be a serious right knee injury during a collision at first base.

“We’ve had some adversity this year and we had some today,” said Wilson, whose team is already without three-year starting shortstop Hayley Stewart (right elbow).

Crest coach Greg Earl was disappointed with the defeat but pleased with his team’s never-say-die attitude.

The Chargers had 11 hits off South Point starter and winner Graylin Huestess, but left 12 runners on base, including leaving the bases loaded twice.

“We just didn’t get the hits when we needed to,” said Earl, whose team had won or shared five of the previous six league titles, including four straight. “We had runners on. We just didn’t get the big hits like they did.”

Dakota Keller, Macy Ollis, Madison Cheek and Emily Triplett had two hits apiece and Kaylee Wacaster slugged a two-run home run to lead Crest’s 11-hit offense.